Let's Discuss BioShock Infinite (HUGE SPOILERS)

So is the office that Booker keeps getting sent back to supposed to imply that he has died (or at least failed) and the game is continued in the next loop? It happens when you die during gameplay and Elizabeth is not around, you reenter the game through the door and it happens several times during the events of the game, usually after something somewhat traumatic. The twins and old Elizabeth suggest that Booker has failed many many times before, so I guess the question is whether we as the player are spanning multiple parallel multiverses (or whatever) over the course of the game or are we playing as a consistant Booker who is "the one" who is finally able to break the cycle?

It was a fantastic game, but I'm disappointed by the apparent lack of new game plus (1999 mode is just a difficulty adjustment right?). Seems like they could've dont something really cool with a new game + that could somehow incorporate the idea of this infinite loop, work it into the fiction. If nothing else I'd like to carry over all the vigors/gear so I can continue to unlock new stuff.

So, when you're standing with Old Elizabeth over the attack on New York, did anyone else check the symbol on her choker? I forgot to, but I suspect that it's the opposite of whatever you chose in the beginning. After all, they had to do something with it.

FemLutece says considers it a thought experiment, but MaleLutece is genuinely remorseful and is trying to atone. FemLutece is going along with it mainly to appease her brother, otherwise, she's enjoying being a dimensional hopping entity.

I have feeling we'll see more of them in the future, but I think Elizabeth's story is pretty much done. But, much like Rapture, she'll show up as a cameo somehow.

I LOOOOOOVED the Rapture cameo, even though I was pretty sure there would be one since they had the perfect setup to put in a small mention to Rapture there, however I didn't expect it to include that much.

Overall, very glad to see Irrational exploring new stories to tell, along with new techniques to follow up on it. Bioshock was amazing for its time, but that story was mostly torn straight from System Shock 2. Also glad that the game didn't devolve into running to the next character behind bullet proof glass that gets killed behind the glass.

One of these days I'd like to see Irrational make a game in one of these interesting worlds they make where combat is not the emphasis, but instead exploration, character interaction, and role playing is the focus.

The only question I have now is how did Comstock know timeline B booker would engrave 'AD' on his hand? Was it simply him asking what he would do himself, or was male Lutece spying on him before he joined Fem Lutece in Columbia?

Hell, how did he even know Booker would try to get to Columbia in the first place? Its not exactly the easiest place to find and there's too many thing's he'd of had to of guessed to even lead him to that conclusion. Was him going back to Columbia actually intended by Comstock? Did he want to trap him there in hopes to kill him and wrap up the last loose end?

In a collectible, Lutece explains that Comstock is riddled with tumors and cancer, and has suffered accelerated aging as well, all from exposure to their rift machine. Hence the apparent age difference

The only question I have now is how did Comstock know timeline B booker would engrave 'AD' on his hand? Was it simply him asking what he would do himself, or was male Lutece spying on him before he joined Fem Lutece in Columbia?

The same reason Comstock knew Booker even had a daughter to sell, the same reason he knew he would die and the same reason he knew a 'false shepherd' would come; by looking through a tear to an alternate dimension where it already happened.

Hell, how did he even know Booker would try to get to Columbia in the first place? Its not exactly the easiest place to find and there's too many thing's he'd of had to of guessed to even lead him to that conclusion. Was him going back to Columbia actually intended by Comstock? Did he want to trap him there in hopes to kill him and wrap up the last loose end?

Comstock did not want Booker there. You can see this in the beginning of the game, there's a sticky note on the map that says something to the effect of " Hes coming, stop him" signed -C. This note was intended for the man that was dead in the same room...killed by Lutese to open Booker's passage. Everything Comstock did was to hinder Booker and stop him from rescuing Liz. This may even explain the creation of Songbird. Old Elizabeth tells Booker that Songbird stops him from rescuing her in every reality, every time; thus enabling the destruction of New York and the fruition of Comstocks' plans. It's possible Comstock also saw this and created the very thing that he saw continually stop Booker. It's a bit of a stretch though.

One thing I didn't understand is what was different about this reality that allowed Old Elizabeth to resist her conditioning and bring Booker to 1984? It was this action that set this reality apart and allowed them to control Songbird and destroy the Siphon, unlocking Elizabeth's powers. This allowed her to see how every reality was following the same two paths that eventually converged into one; the destruction of New York. It also allowed her to see what was necessary to stop it. Obviously this had not happened in any other reality, so what made her able to do it in this one?

We need a spoliercast for this game! It was great. Beat it in a single day. Still wrapping my head around it. =)

Why shall there be multiple endings when you can have one EPIC ending?

Wouldn't be surprised if the upcoming DLC dabbles in alternate endings.

@bombedyermom: I dont think so but everything is possible.

I screenshotted her during that moment, she has no choker or symbol. Just a collared jacket.

Wow what an ending, had to make an account just so I had somewhere to discuss this game xD. Anyway here are some hopefully not to rambling thoughts...

The only thing that left me with questions was how exactly did Elizabeth have her powers? I gather that Lutece's got the ability through experimenting with their technology but was it something Elizabeth was born with? or did she get them when she crossed over as a baby? She says she has had them as long as she could remember so I kind of got the impression it wasn't through experimentation. I am not sure the answer is in the game it might just be left to the interpretation of the player but I probably missed something. Also I am assuming that the fact the only Elizabeth that didn't disappear at the very end was "my" (for a lack of a better term) Elizabeth, meant that she had transcended the whole multiverse thing and was her own unique entity free to do whatever now. And/Or was the post credit ending kind of suggesting that maybe Booker and Elizabeth/Anna might have been given the opportunity to start over from the beginning and get things right? Will be interesting to see what if anything DLC might do with that.

All in all I really loved the game and thought it was amazing but there were a few things that caused some disconnect for me. I felt like for the first two thirds of the game the real driving forces where these themes of racism, class, religion and nationalism but by the last third of the game those themes had really been pushed completely aside to focus on Elizabeth and the multiverse stuff. Which isn't to say I didn't like Elizabeth or her story and the very personal tale of a father and a daughter, in fact I absolutely loved it and the whole giant scifi story with all its implications and the way it tied into the rest of the Bioshock universe was great. It just felt like other then religion (specifically with the baptism being the moment in which the two possible Booker's were created, which I actually really liked and I found it very interesting and enjoyable that who I would consider to be the least terrible version of Booker/Comstock was the one that rejected religion and a false sense of forgiveness and instead faced and accepted the things he had done couldn't just go away. And of course that baptism, which is supposed to be a rebirth, instead ultimately turned into the death of all possible Comstocks. I thought that was an amazing ending) the rest of the themes didn't really tie into the end or go anywhere. It was especially noticeable during the last enemy encounter where the vox, who I honestly felt were pretty entitled to their rebellion despite the game trying to play it off like they were as bad as Comstock, were just the last group of faceless enemies I had to kill before I could destroy the tower. I don't know, it just seemed like the first part of Infinite could have gone off and been its own game completely separate from the second part or something, did anyone else feel this way?

The other thing that kind of took me out of the experience, and this is more of a video game problem then specifically a Bioshock problem, was some of the brutal violence and the lack of a reaction to it. Specifically I am talking about the possession power. I found it incredibly useful and it ended up being my go to vigor, but after ever enemy battle I would always have one possessed guy left who would run over right next to Elizabeth and then proceed to blow his head off with a shotgun or beat himself to death with a bat and Elizabeth would have absolutely no reaction to the fact I was making otherwise subdued foes kill themselves in horrific ways inches in front of her face. It was only so noticeable because other then that game did an amazing job of making her seem like a real person. Some of the skyhook kills also just kind of seemed like to much for the type of game and story it was but maybe that's just me.

And lastly after beating the game I remembered a conversation between Booker and Elizabeth around when they first met where Booker commented on the fact he had never heard of Columbia which confused Elizabeth because from what she had read everyone knew of Columbia and it was a pretty big deal and Booker just says something like he must not have been keeping up with the news. Obviously he didn't know about it because he comes from a reality where Columbia doesn't exist but I am assuming that there are probably a ton of other little hints and foreshadowing about the ending of the story through out the first part of the game and was curious what other people might have noticed and remembered.

@igooner7: Levine has stated previously that unlike Bioshock 1 (where he was 'forced' by 2K to include multiple endings) this is a story with a set narrative with only the most minor of player choices outside of moment-to-moment gameplay. Unless they screw around with alternate endings with the alternate universes: This is the end.

It's just occured to me that one of the DLC's might be DeWitt's time with the Vox in the first alternate universe you visit, leading up to Booker's death and that Voxophone he records that you find. That could actually be a pretty cool story driven DLC that doesn't compromise the experience of the primary game.

Technically they are, remember? Jack is a clone of Ryan.

Just finished it. I took my time and collected most of the logs and took in the scenery. While I think the game is an absolute masterpiece of presentation, and a ton of fun to play, I was super disappointed in the story. I'm really not a big fan of stories that wrap themselves up by invalidating most of their own content. I just thought it completely fell apart in the last third. You could interpret the story as never having happened at all, which is infuriating. Songbird, Comstock, Vox, the weird ghost mom thing (wtf, seriously), none of it winds up having any actual meaning; It's just Booker and his daughter, which would've been fine if the main character of the game wasn't really Columbia.

It just seemed random and inconsequential to me. It made the world I'd played through much less interesting.

I will say though, that the many worlds, constants and variables bit? Absolute, pure, world building genius. It reminded me a little of the end of Contact actually, if anyone remembers that movie.

Just finished the game. My mind has been irreparably damaged and blown into millions of tiny pieces...I may never recover. What a fucking game.

Jack was the son the Ryan. Just enough of Ryan to make all the automated defenses in rapture take pause before killing him, which is a handy story reason to explain why all the turrets and cameras had a small pause before they triggered if they spotted you.

This looked like the most interesting discussion on the game and its ending so I wanted to give my thoughts. First I really liked the game and the ending but it sits weird with me. So I gotta talk about it!

Sorry its long but I read everyone's comments up to this point. All my issues are either not said by anyone else or a response to someone's post.

Beginning of the game. Who put the note on the door bring us to girl to erase the debt? Who killed the guy in the lighthouse? Was he just a guard? I would say the Luteces but they don't directly interact with anything in their weird new quantum state. They certainly don't kill anyone. They only talk to Booker and Elizabeth and give them items from time to time. Also they gave Booker a gun in the beginning, he totally should of been able to take care of 1 guard in the beginning he didn't need that help. Any connections to the musical notes to fly up to Columbia and songbird?

For the people who don't believe the Luteces are the same person from different dimensions. Someone already explained that with infinite possibilities there is a chance you can be born male or female thats why the different genders for the same person in this case. I suggest you find more audio logs, I didn't get all of them, but I got most, I missed about 7. I'll try to listen to them all when I can. One talks about how they are the same person and spoke to each other using science. As for PROOF, the ending the male one says he went through the same thing as Booker right after he leaves the room after he handed the baby over. He is referring to the memory merge of other versions of himself. The Luteces went through the same thing likely the first time the met. Booker goes through this when he kills Comstock (why it dosn't happen before or more importantly why he doesn't get any Comstock's memories, I don't know. I will talk about this further down). This leads to the explanation that the reason the male and female Luteces are so in sync with each other is because they share the same memories. The moment a memory is formed the other instantly knows and can finish the sentence. If you want to get technical there is probably some quantum stuff happening where they know who's going to do which part of the sentence so that they don't talk at the same time so they yield each other in turn so they don't speak to each other. I'd say this is either because of 1 or both of these reasons, the memory sharing and in one audio log they say they were killed and didn't die, I'm guessing a dumbass who was sent to kill them killed them in their office with the (time?)machine. In the audio log they say their atoms or whatever were scattered through possibility or something. This is why their powers are more god-like. They just pop in and out and disappear without even using tears. I think they were very interesting characters and since they became scattered they seem to be the only 2 Latices in the universe unlike everyone else who has infinite versions of themselves they have their past actions's many versions and then anytime after their death there are JUST those 2. Last bit of evidence, they tease you that they won't leave till you do when you first see them and linger. And in the bar when you shoot them it clearly hits them but the female Lutece says "you missed". They acknowledge your attempts and tell you what happened when you shot them very funny stuff lol. Anyway they can no longer be killed.

About when the main char dies in-gameplay. The first time it happens and Elizabeth isn't around he opens his office door and is like "wtf?". I am thinking that reality becomes one where he died and then ANOTHER version of booker runs through the whole game up to the point that you are at and then continues. All memories converge and the prev one is either assimilated or that doesn't happen because everything up to that point was the same anyway.

For the people who want to believe Booker and Comstock being the same person is only FIGURATIVE due to the comparisons between how they both treated Elizabeth. I think this is not the the case. The game went to extreme lengths to shove it into your face and its in within possibility due to the things the game introduces for them to be the same. Multiple universes, time travel etc. If they just wanted to point out a thematic similarity they didn't have to do the detailed explanation at the end (which still left out some things). But my biggest reason why I think it was literal is because if it wasn't the Elizabeths don't have a reason to kill Booker. What would be the reason if not to close all timelines by ending Comstock. Elizabeth doesn't seem mad she was given away at all. She has more of the attitude that this is what happened and accepts that part. She seems to hate Comstock more and still empathetic to Booker since she says at the last door "Are you SURE you want to do this?". So even if he doesn't know she's agreeing the end desired result is to end Comstock.

Now about the stuff I thought was weird or possible holes. I want to figure these out. I hope they aren't oversights.

Comstock. Why does he have a weird warping voice sometimes? You meet him and hes just a normal human, no Quantum anything going on. Unlike Lutece's voice in the beginning through the door that is warped but that makes sense.

It seems like if you die once and then merge with another version of yourself you become a zombie. We saw this when we saw the first people who died and then a dimension jump. And at the Asylum where I'm guessing Elizabeth converged all versions of all people and destroyed the world? And then bombed New York for no good reason afterwards? I'm wondering who were those real people who appeared a few times in that future and how she made dimensional monster(s?). The blind one who sees you and sics the inmates at you. That could be 1 guy or I guess she could of made a few. Though with her powers unchained she'd be able to CREATE beings. My problem is this should happen to booker when he dies in-game. He should be a dimensional zombie. If not when he dies in gameplay if you want to say those "never happned" in cannon though I do think the game did make those deaths cannon, then right at the moment he killed Comstock. He merges with him after he dies since his nose bleeds and the screen gets static but doesn't become a zombie or remember his death. The static is a tell tale sign of the dimensional shift. You see it when you jump from dimension to dimension. Why does Booker never remember dying. Actually he does, the 1st time you die in-game. The static and black and white you see when you are at your office door is a sign that what is happening is dimensional Its possible he doesn't go through all the motions and a Lutece just throws one through the door to THAT VERY POINT in time and space if one booker dies lol. memories merge and he continues own. (but the question of physical items becomes an issue in that theory. Ammo, guns etc. as it would be on a separate dead Booker body). Back to the point about zombies. He possibly doesn't remember his death because it hasn't happened yet? (young booker younger than old booker who is the one that died.) But the game introduces a phenomenon of merging to a degree where 2 of the same person are in the same dimension at all. I admit the young booker vs older booker is unique to their situation and could be where that explanation to that lies. If you remember dying effects went into the future everyone would remember dying of old age so I think you remember up to the point of your other self's age. Meaning Old Booker-Comstock would know everything booker knows and everything he does as he does it. Young one won't know anything about Old one but then he shouldn't of been affected at ALL when Old Booker-Comstock dies in that case @_@

Comstock knows the future, but more than that he knows about every action Booker will take. I doubt he used the machine so much that he could draw up that detailed prophecy in the room right before you meet him. He sees Elizabeth killing Kilroy etc. I guess he had a time machine and a dimensional machine since you see him old fleeing the young booker. Male Lutece is there and I think its his first time to cross (so the jump was back in time AND in another dimension since Comstock had to pick a world where he didn't get reborn as to not endanger another Comstock lol). So he could have done stuff in these times so much he became old (20 years of jumping around time and then going back to "home base". But thats something I'd expect to be explicit in the game and I didn' see that). BUT I think his prophecies and foresight lies in him merging memories with Booker. He sees EVERYTHING booker does makes that detailed 6 panel summary of the game in the room before you meet him (for what reason?). The reason I think this is because he knows small stuff like the fact booker wrote AD on his hand. Since Comstock doesn't have this. I'm guessing he did it AFTER his failed rebirth. Unless he has a sharp eye while fleeing time holding a baby under pressure and in a tug of war lol. Although I think that is the official explanation :/ He does seem to have that advertisement up rather fast about the mark on his hand (side note how could Booker forget when he literally has Anna's Death AD engraved in his hand @_@ ) Anyway I support my idea because he has a WHOLE false profit prophecy. It goes beyond just a mark on his hand to identify him.

What I just said doesn't make any sense. Because Comstock doesn't try to kill Booker with any foreknowledge He just taunts him, does a half assed attempt and then doesn't do anything directly. He just throws up hurdles. There is not 1 attempt to kill Booker using foreknowledge either through shared memories or seeing the future. Whats the point of the prophecy, whats the point of putting Elizabeth in a tower? Whats the point of knowing everything Booker will do, write it on the wall and then let him kill Comstock? When he dies his final words is something like "AND NOW IT IS DONE". Him dying doesn't lead to the goal of destroying the world. His stated goal is what it always seemed like. Destroy Sodom, indoctrinate his people, groom his biological daughter to take his place since he saw his attempts will work and thats why he does it since he'll be too old by the time his civilization is able to take over the world. My only guess is that he couldn't anticipate OLD ELIZABETH'S time altering to make them win the final VOX fight. But if he knew they'd lose the VOX fight WHY COMMIT SUICIDE. He had no weapon and just talks about the finger and rages like a senile old man. Was he so sure nothing could possibly go wrong that he had to die right then and there? That accomplished... what?

Why does Comstock have 2 seemingly conflicting goals? Actually that is a question I have no idea. I don't see the motivation being: him trying to steal his daughter from himself so he can save his daughter from himself (meaning he needs to do something evil arbitrarily just to be an obstacle for obstacle's sake.) all for the purpose of killing himself so that he never sold his daughter to himself. I just noticed that when Booker is drowned at the end HE ACTUALLY IS WASHING AWAY HIS SINS. Unfortunately this falls flat because the original impetus for him to wash away his sins was BEFORE he sold his daughter so he already hated himself (maybe it was the stuff he did at wounded knee). The only thing that supports his self-defeating prophecy is the fact he changes Anna's name to Elizabeth to obscure it for ONLY young Booker who is the only one who would care allowing him to stay blind till the end. That can be argued that is to hinder him from finding Anna and having motivation though but by changing the name, he ALREADY knows he will be looking for her making the naming irrelevant in any case other than the self-defeating one.

The other reason why I think this is because a LOT of places were COMPLETELY unguarded. The ENTIRE place that Elizabeth was held had 0 count it ZERO guards. No scientists either which is weird since they were supposed to be observing her 24/7 right? Thats why they made that elaborate observing room. The only people that try to stop Booker are the ones that HAPPEN to find him based off info Comstock gave him LOOONG ago (pre-game) about a prophecy. Also they totally don't know what he looks like, his description for a while was he was either a Dwarf or a Giant and some other details were wrong like hair or something. COMSTOCK DOESN'T CORRECT THEM. At any point. A lot of fights afterwards are just in chaos and they are killing everyone so he is included. Or he gets caught somewhere he shouldn't be. I really don't think Comstock is trying to stop Booker. It could be so he gets to the end and kills him and then fails the Vox battle.

Interesting stuff. Slate talks about how the facts Comstock says doesn't match up to reality. Maybe that Comstock comes from a reality where that actually was true? Of course it could just be lies to hype himself up, there are times he did that like when he killed his wife and the Luteces. The Luteces know about what Booker does BEFORE he does it. Thats why they say he DOESN'T row. They brought him to he dock a bunch of times thats why they know he doesn't row the boat, I think most people will see that on a second playthrough cool though. Someone else mentioned the coin filp. I don't know why people think there was an option here to choose he just chooses heads on his own its ingrained in the story as EVERY Booker who came through always picked heads and he wasn't an "anomaly" or anything to pick tails he is/was always the same when he goes through the game. I found that interesting. Since this game has some quantum physics I guess you are supposed to superimpose the bird and cage neck-bracelet over each other in your mind so its a bird in a cage as choosing either option means that you chose both. But I don't know what significance it has besides that, its a good way to identify YOUR Elizabeth though.

Why does Elizabeth have powers? Just... Why? She wasn't a test tube baby she is Booker's biological daughter. Her powers are siphoned off to fuel what? (I'm guessing this has an explanation I couldn't find. The time/space machine? But they wouldn't of been able to make the time machine to be able to GET her if that was the case). She has crazy god-like powers. Its not like just a little telepathic which I can buy that with no explanation Just she's a mutant like X-men and she can do stuff, that'd be fine.BUT she has all the powers to manipulate the universe and create tears and I really don't know why. That's too much power to not have a detailed origin explanation.

The ending didn't make sense? Why would killing Booker end the cycle. He is ONE Booker but like 7 Elizabeths kill him. Isn't that inefficient? For every 1 Booker killed 6 more get away? The one corresponding to all those 6 other Elizabeths. or they already killed theirs and hate Booker so much, because he STILL IS BOOKER, that they had to watch him die (again?). When she brought him to that time at the baptism, everyone disappeared including the Priest! How is she still at the same point in time that she needs to kill Booker at? Why doesn't she kill every Booker that come out as Comstock? Why does she have to kill the Booker that allows her to be a father who doesn't sell her (with a lot of debt mind you but I doubt anyone else wants to buy his baby). Killing 1 Booker at the pivotal point of becoming both might close some gaps, but remember she has to keep killing Bookers forever as there are an infinite number of Bookers and judging by the ending the ones that are done come to watch they don't free up as they kill. Some even disappeared. Weird the middle one doesn't disappear(?) Since its not even the Elizabeth you go through the game with No bird/cage neck-bracelet. Booker also says "Who are you" to the first one he sees in the middle recognizing she's not even his Elizabeth. So my point is, instead of being free or even disappearing, she is killing Booker for eternity. Since there are an infinite number of words if the title is to believed or just a million million if Elizabeth is to be believed. If that's the case it can be assumed all the Elizabeths kill all the Bookers at the same time and it IS closed. A separate issue I have with the ending is that she kills the POST GAME booker. Not the PRE-GAME booker/comstock possibility that they were talking about. Since when did his body merge with other Bookers? He isn't disorientated in the way of merging memories so he isn't an amalgam of every Booker in the universe (meaning 1 kill to remove all bookers). Elizabeth sees all time and space so its to believe her judgement is to be trusted but, no priest or ppl like the real time happened. Just that same location she kills post-game booker. This also doesn't do anything to the bioshock 1,2 universe or any other one where the main guy isn't also the villain so I'm guessing a lot of worlds and this is NOT the end all perfect solution afterall?

Funny stuff. Slate says he knows Booker from the war. He also says he knows COMSTOCK. He knows comstock is lying about doing the battles he claims to have done. So this would imply he knows Booker is comstock? Is that why he fights Booker and is suicidal? But in the other reality he teams up with booker to fight... Comstock. Just a light issue thats why I say it here, it might not even be an issue. Elizabeth's random actions come in at bad times sometimes. Like something big will happen and Immediately after she will yawn, or sigh. That took me out of the experience a bit. She didn't wait 1 second to get bored. I'm sure it happened during other people's playthough. A very inappropriate yawn. Hope they patch the game so it happens less frequently and especially not right after a pre-determined game sequence.

Weird main char deaths are across dimensions. Slate dies in universe 1 (or goes to jail and can't speak "a fate worse than death"), this is first one player plays in, so does chen. then they jump Chen is alive but a dimensional zombie, they try to cure him, then realize they don't care as they jump a 3rd time to a 3rd world and see Chen died in the attack he helped start? (But they still didn't give the weapons to the Vox?) Fink and Kilroy die in the 3rd world. You could say him never making it stopped by songbird and the world destroyed by Elizabeth happens in the 3rd world you see and you beat the game in the last few scenes in world 4 when you're sent back to an earlier time inside Comstock house. Its possible this is just world 3 but altered in time. In which case after this you kill Comstock which is at LEAST not the same Comstock you've been going after the whole game, though it doesn't matter since any one Comstock is not enough for Elizabeth. The question is, which bosses are still alive and which are dead and which are dimensional zombies? LOL. Also, they never revisit the old worlds so what happens to the versions of them that were in the world they jumped to or the ones they jumped from where there is no Booker or Elizabeth anymore? That would make Comstock's domination vision INCORRECT in a lot of worlds. 2(or 3) for every 1 that its fulfilled. (There should be a Booker and Elizabeth (and within that, Booker Elizabeth would also be from a world not of that current one) in the world they jumped to) So... all the multiple versions also jumped to a 2nd and 3rd universe doing a kind of infinite shuffle to the left? No one ending up in the world they started on which was an alternate for them to begin with?

Final thoughts. I was disappointed you don't fight songbird :( Looked like the game was pointing towards a final big battle against a strong force satisfying end boss. Esp since Booker is told he never beats songbird (could of fit in a battle where you have to lose right there or at least a battle) so you'd need to fight him WITH Elizabeth's help. I thought it would of been cool if the neck-bracelet you choose for Elizabeth would branch the endings. Keep the bird or keep the cage would = Save Elizabeth or put her back in the cage(siphon). Songbird is shown in all the trailers and its like wow I can't wait to fight him. EVERYONE was waiting for it. and nope! Narrative-wise its ok but I wanted a boss battle, at least one. Somehow the game is ok without them but if I were to label any faults to the game it would be that. Why did songbird ave to die if she now has full control over him? Mercy killing? So songbird isn't a robot but a creature that needs air to live. So... What is songbird!!! lol.

After credits scene. wtf? he's not dead? He's pulled out of time? I have no clue, is Elizabeth dead? unborn? REborn? I guess the only thing that can be gleamed is that dying in that ending isn't as grim as it seems as that last scene is still possible. A possible explanation is that when you see the Elizabeth disappear, HE also disappears under the water and dead, but still gone from existence. So end credits is a time reset, he has his baby back (and debt lol). He shouldn't have any memories of any of this. Problem is some people say his baby was conceived (or just born) after the baptism?

@karl_kablisk: In regards to the after credit scene

Having killed Booker at that one point in time (the Baptism) would only destroy the universes that forked off after that event. So in Other Universes where that choice never came up i dont find it too far fetched that Booker and Elizibeth still exist (in a different universe than the ones the game take place in, but perhaps retaining the memories of the games events), its just the universes containing Comstock are destroyed.

Yes. Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, YES!

You know what would be a good setting for an Irrational game? The old tv show, The Prisoner. It's such a good fit for what Irrational does well that it's sickening that it won't ever happen.

Has anyone figured out why Comstock is such a horrible person? Sure, he didn't go through the decade of regret and misery that our Booker went through, but it still seems so crazy that he's the same person as Booker. As the audio logs imply, Comstock isn't even that much older than Booker, and yet now he's the kind of guy that would: be openly racist (when Booker is implied to be pretty accepting of other ethnicities), murder his wife based on paranoia, murder the two people that helped him get where he was and imprison and torture a child that isn't his. If there's one big fault I find with Levine's story, it's that he seems to have written Comstock to just be unbearably shitty. That might not have been so bad if this complete monster didn't also happen to be Booker, a very flawed man but not one beyond introspection.

Just to clear things up other people have wondered regarding why Comstock never bothered trying to actually kill Booker using foreknowledge; it wasn't about killing him, it was about making Elizabeth believe he was truly a False Shepard. Think about it; Booker's given motivation is to give Elizabeth away when he gets her out of Columbia, sends wave after wave of people for him to slaughter right in front of her, he leads them to a place where Booker is forced to admit his terrible past through the Hall of Heroes, he traps Elizabeth in a way that potentially prevents Booker from ever freeing her again, and then in the end he forces Booker to murder the shit out of him right in front of her. What he didn't count on was Elizabeth still caring for Booker after all that. That's my interpretation anyway.

The one thing I don't understand, and it seems minor but it doesn't make sense. Why there's 80's music everywhere. I get why Elizabeth was humming Tears For Fears before you meet her (cos she heard it through a tear). But why was Tainted Love being played in the Finkton bar? And another song that I can't recall (Hey Mickey?) in the tear in the musician's apartment next to the graveyard.

Perhaps it's because the Luteces knew it from their travels and brought it through with them to Columbia?

Anyone that could expand on it or explain, help a brutha out.

I'm guessing you didn't check out the floating house in the area where you fight Elizabeth's mother? If you did, you'd hear an audio log from a music producer saying that these holes in the universe are an amazing inspiration or something like that; you can assume that he made the old-timey versions based on songs he was hearing from tears.

OH yeah. Makes sense now. I think I picked that audiolog up but forgot to listen to it because I got distracted. Thanks.

So here's a question to folks, what happened to that big crazy dude with the hat and moustache that popped up in the audio-logs occasionally? I was hoping to meet him or at least find a satisfying conclusion to his story, but instead I think I just found one last audiolog saying he was going to kill Comstock.

Theoretically, new dimensions spin out of every variable. So when you choose to drink coffee in the morning instead of a different beverage an infinite number of other dimensions are created to fulfill the other potentialities. The infinite dimensions containing a Comstock, a Columbia, an Elizabeth all exist based upon the choice that Booker makes at the baptism so, in the context of the story at least, eliminating Booker before he can ever make that choice nullifies the existence of all of those dimensions, they simply cease to be. In the context of the story, it makes sense...

...if you allow that Elizabeth creates a convergence of pre-choice dimensions in that final moment where they drown the dude. Essentially, that would be the real motivation for the Luteces to free Elizabeth, I think. I believe that is what Irrational are trying to communicate in that scene, a convergence of potentialities. Folding every instance of that moment upon itself, basically creating infinite tears through all of the dimensions, would make a "Booker Prime" who can be killed and eliminated from all timelines.

Or to put it another way, "a Wizard did it."

In terms of things that I noticed in the game that impressed me:

The first time you go to another reality, where the Vox have the guns and have risen in the working district, you walk past a booth near a door that had a caricature of some guy with a big nose attached to the booth and it still says "yid" and "heeb" on the booth. I don't know if I was reading too much in to it but it looked like 'across realities the Jew is always targeted'

In an interview before the game came out with Levine talking about someone resigning when they saw something in the game. Can anyone think of what that might have been?

Great summary. Great comments from others as well. Pieced together some things I was missing.

It's funny, I had hypothesized fairly early that the Luteces were the same person from two different dimensions, but I never came across the audio log that stated it! Glad I was confirmed as being correct.

I think the City as a story element doesn't really cache out in the end. You just don't get the same sense of Why He Built The City that you do from BioShock. But I missed a bunch of audio logs, so maybe it's fleshed out more. It seems like Comstock is content in dying because it was prophesied that he must die in order for Elizabeth to continue his work.

In Comstock's timeline, I really didn't get the sense that everyone there was somehow preparing to do battle with "The Sodom Below". Comstock's whole religious mission seems to hinge on the importance of this event, yet most people are just chilling at the beach? Why wait until 1984 to attack? And the attack doesn't look that impressive? It would be like a flying wooden ship showing up in the harbour and blasting skyscrapers with cannon balls. They don't show off any amazing quantum weapons, really. Do they want to destroy the whole world? Or is just New York a Sodom? Or maybe they go from city to city and only got around to New York in 1984? The motivations of the City as a Weapon are lost on me. I don't understand their goals, or how they wish to achieve them.

Need to play again and get all the audio logs!

Also, the part about timeline B Booker isn't totally correct. Firstly, the Lutece's go to his dimension where he gave Comstock the child, and then pull him over to Comstock's dimension, because in Booker B's, Columbia obviously doesn't exist. Doing so made him forget about Anna almost all together, except when he isn't fully conscious, which explains why the 'AD' mark on his hand surprises him and why he tells Elizabeth that that his daughter is dead.

I love how the story wraps up at the ends, kinda ties both 1 and Infinite together even though its not really a "happy" in the hollywood type ending it makes sense and is well written....

But I wonder if a mass amount of people will be outraged like they were when Mass Effect 3 had its ending.... The heroes are sacrificed for the betterment of others or the world in both the Mass Effect & Bio-Shock series... I feel that rage was unjust in the case of ME 3 mainly because you being Shepherd like in Bio you have choices that aren't clear to the effect to your cause if any.... Sometimes your choices have no effect as to what will/has to happen....

Not sure if this is what you're referring to, but I saw that someone sent a letter of resignation after seeing a late game scene with Father Comstock because it offended his religious sensibilities. Levine talked to him about it and changed the scene, and the guy still works there now.

Which does make sense to a degree; Comstock is at times cartoonishly evil, so if this is him after rewrites it must have been pretty hardcore beforehand. "Atheists eating babies" etc.

I feel somewhat cheated that the game crashed on me during the credits. I only learned a few hours later about the after the credits scene which just brings up more questions really.

I love this ending but I feel somewhat cheated that this was all thrown at me during the very end. I almost feel like m night shyamalan was about to jump into the room and yell "WHAT A TWIST!"

I can't put all the pieces together, but I can't help but feel like you guys are sorta missing the point and that the entire game is a commentary on game sequels. There is some really heavy-handed signs like the name (especially considering the series history) and the fact that they included the rapture bit. I believe the characters aren't just characters, but rather symbolic representations of larger concepts.

But then again I might just be crazy. I'll just leave with a link and quote

Link

"For me and the team it was about not repeating ourselves," he said.

"If you look at, whether it's a Final Fantasy where one game in the series is very different to another, or even Alien and Aliens is a great example: two very different stories, one's a haunted house movie and one's an action movie."

Not to repeat to much of what I posted earlier but I thought it might have been the baptism thing at the very end. Booker rejects the baptism, and thus religion, as solution to his problems and is ultimately much better off for it when compared to the version who embraces religion. Although I am an atheist myself, so I might not pick up on or be offended by things a religious person would, it felt like all the other anti-religious stuff could be played off as Comstock is just a liar and false prophet perverting the word of god and isn't a true believer, all of which are common themes in Christianity and other religions and would not necessarily challenge a religious person world view. But then you get to the very end and find that by taking a sort of cure all forgiveness and salvation via religious conversion, instead of facing what he had done and the man he was, it allowed him to go on to do more horrible things, but this time guilt free and with god's will as a justification. That to me was a very clear rejection on the stories part of some key ideas about salvation and forgiveness that some religions have so I couldn't imagine what else it might have been. But then again we all bring are own perspectives and baggage into interrupting these sorts of stories

@ares42 said:

I can't put all the pieces together, but I can't help but feel like you guys are sorta missing the point and that the entire game is a commentary on game sequels. There is some really heavy-handed signs like the name (especially considering the series history) and the fact that they included the rapture bit. I believe the characters aren't just characters, but rather symbolic representations of larger concepts.

That is an interesting thought and as I believe the review said the game does play with your expectations of a Bioshock game in some interesting way, Elizabeth straight up makes a joke about it and of course the name. I am not entirely sure it goes much far beyond that, but definitely gives me something to think about, there might be more pieces to be found. But I wouldn't say other people are missing the point, more that with all the other ideas and themes the game deals with there is also some meta commentary on games going on as well.

@ares42:

While I do agree that the entire game does lend itself as a commentary on the gaming practice of today - And I do believe, somewhere down the line that it was someway intended - I feel that calling it the main point of the games story really squanders and diminishes how great the story actually is. We aren't 'missing the point' here, we are just enjoying what the writers and developers of this game have created.

Just a minor thing that irks me, but I felt like there's this weird dissonance between how you are introduced to Columbia and how the rest of the game plays out. In that very first area, it seems pretty clear that Columbians worship the founding fathers and use the symbols of the key, the scroll and the sword to represent them. Yet, for the rest of the game, I feel like they're never explicitly mentioned again and Comstock seems to be the central religious figure. Maybe it's just a victim of the game being rewritten constantly, but I don't feel like there was as much jingoism/American Exceptionalism as the game initially sets up and is more about racism and whatnot. Just a weird thing I noticed.

I just realized what this was... that's pretty fucked up

This game is very audacious, but there are still a lot of deus ex machina moments and everything feels like a slave to the plot. Everything is deterministic and arbitrary in service of the final conclusion, and not in a good way. Still a great experience and this is one of the best video game stories, but games still have a long way to go.

And obviously the characters are symbolic representations of played out concepts. I mean, Super Mario Bros almost takes place in the Bioshock universe now. One story told well is every story. But does anyone think this just open the gates for a Bioshock 3 wherein you enter a giant light house under mysterious circumstances and rescue a girl while fighting off giant monsters and mad geniuses?

@arbitrarywater: I felt this way too. The story forgets about the City. None of the inhabitants seem particularly phased by events unfolding in the game. You always just battle the cops and rebels, and you don't get any sincere reactions from regular people as the game progresses, aside from a few sad people evacuating due to the Vox driving them out. I never got the feeling that this city's inhabitants were preparing to bombard the "Sodom Below".

@fengshuigod: Yes, but what is a lighthouse? I mean that in a way that when they say there's always these four elements (A lighthouse, a dude, etc) that they will be there but they won't be as pronounced. Like, who's to say that it couldn't have a guy who has a lighthouse poster on his wall and he has to save his girl from a rowdy gang of super nerds with a stereotypical 80's jock protecting her? At least that's how I see it.

I wanted to know what do you guys think about this situation:

After third time/dimension jump, when whole Columbia is on fire, cops and vox are fighting against each other, you are going to meet with Daisy Fitzroy in Finks Tower. When Booker and Elizabeth are going up in an elevator Daisy says through phone to Booker that he suppose to be dead long ago("I saw your dead body" - or something like this). Thanks to his sacrifice she started revolution and present Booker can only be a ghost or impostor. At some point in that universe Booker seeing his Hero Poster gets nose bleed - he is not remembering his death in this world. Later on you are able to find couple of his recorded logs(one has his last words - before his death). He suppose to be dead in this world and of course he is but he is alive as well. I would prefer if there was somekind of time paradox, but it's a different world. Infinite world is made out of infinite possible worlds where you can make new multiple worlds by changing one thing in old one. I lost my track what I wanted to say. Mostly I wanted to ask what you guys and girls think about situation with Daisy in Fink Tower.

The ending is so, so godamn good. The Rapture bit is just... Massive smile across my face dude.

The ending just fucking glitched on me... the best ending I have seen a in long while, and it fucking glitches right at the end when you open the last door (I opened it and boom credits). I had to watch it on youtube...

BRB, going to kill myself. >: (

I got over it. It only happened to me about five times, five times, five times, five times, five times.

Just beat it. Man, what a game. I guess I get why some people are saying its got a bad ending but I think it's brilliant. What you think this game is about, and what it actually is is crazy. I now get why the game is called Bioshock Infinite for starters.

Actually I take it back. I don't get why people think its a bad ending.

Dude... my mind just exploded. This game is brilliant !

To be fair, I partially understand the criticism; In all the time spent in the game, I never understood the character of Columbia itself; unlike Rapture, which spent a lot of time reinforcing exactly why someone would want to make it and how, it's sort of taken for granted that the How is "some crazy science shit from Letuce" and the Why is "Comstuck, I dunno, REALLY doesn't like people that don't share his faith". While I liked the ending, I didn't come out feeling satisfied about the nature of Columbia. It was still just this crazy fantasty land, overshadowed by the alternate reality plot-line.

Time travel stories like this always screw me up, and to be fair I didn't play the game, I just lurked around threads like this and combined that with what I already knew.

I think Elizabeth is able to see and manipulate tears because her physical being is present in two different worlds. Her finger is in the Booker reality, and the rest of her is in one of the many Comstock realities. So, at the end of the game when the Elizabeths kill Booker and then disappear.... how could they drown him without them existing in the first place? That means that atleast one Dimension voyaging Elizabeth still needs to exist and one timeline needs to be maintained in order for the cycle to carry out. I guess they had this idea for a really long time considering they had a "Days of the Future Past" cover in one of the game magazines.

Also, instead of Lutece telegram saying "Don't pick #77" they just should have told him "Cover up your right hand or something". Seriously, that AD mark was going to get him caught eventually.

As for that one religious guy getting pissed, I think its because the game implies Booker becoming a born again christian led to all of the nativist drivel that Comstock believed and caused him to go a 180 on his Wounded Knee experience.